Election 2020 live updates: Georgia nears recount completion; no more uncounted ballots found
will seek a recount of ballots in some Wisconsin counties, hoping to overturn the election results in his favor.
Trump’s campaign paid the state $3 million as of Wednesday morning to start a partial recount, according to the Wisconsin Elections Commission. The campaign has not yet filed a formal petition, the commission said, but noted one is expected today.
Trump would have had to pay nearly $8 million to conduct a full statewide recount of Wisconsin, a state he narrowly lost two weeks ago. A recount of certain counties costs less.
It’s unclear in which counties Trump will seek a recount. A spokeswoman for the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to questions from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
– Molly Beck (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)
Poll: Half of Republicans say Trump ‘rightfully won’ election
About half of Republicans in a new a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll say President Donald Trump “rightfully won” the presidential election.
Overall, 73% of those polled Nov. 13-17 believe Biden won the election while 5% believe he had lost it. When specifically asked whether Biden “rightfully won” the election, Republicans became much more skeptical, with 52% saying Trump “rightfully won” while 29% said Biden “rightfully won,” the poll found.
Overall, 55% of U.S. adults said they believed the election was “legitimate and accurate,” down 7 points from a similar poll conducted after the 2016 election. That poll found 52% of Democrats saw the loss of Hillary Clinton as “legitimate and accurate” compared to only 26% of Republicans in 2020 who say the same of Trump’s loss.
Trump has repeatedly accused the election of being tainted with widespread voter fraud and has refused to concede to Biden. There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the election.
Trump has still filed multiple lawsuits in swing states alleging voter fraud, many are ongoing while several have been dismissed.
– Matthew Brown
Biden to meet with frontline health care workers
President-elect Joe Biden on Wednesday will hold a virtual meeting with frontline health care workers battling the COVID-19 pandemic.
Biden said Monday if outgoing President Donald Trump – who has refused to concede the election – continues to stonewall transition efforts, “many people may die” if the new administration is not able to coordinate on management of the pandemic.
Trump has no events on his schedule Wednesday. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will meet with transition advisers.
– Sean Rossman
Biden picks for top White House jobs draw contrast with Trump
President-elect Joe Biden signaled Tuesday he intends to draw on longtime, loyal aides with deep government experience when he enters the White House next year – breaking with the anti-establishment approach President Donald Trump embraced after his election four years ago.
With a series of personnel announcements Tuesday, the shape of the team that will occupy the West Wing after Jan. 20 came into sharper focus, with Biden turning to several aides who worked for him as vice president and others who either served President Barack Obama or have lengthy resumes from elsewhere in government.
“It’s a lot of experience,” Phil Schiliro, former director of legislative affairs for Obama, said of Biden’s picks, adding that they should help him get up and running quickly.
Biden’s appointments, which included Steve Ricchetti, a longtime adviser and lobbyist, and Rep. Cedric Richmond of Louisiana, represented a departure from many of Trump’s early appointments of outsider figures to top White House jobs – from strategist Steve Bannon to son-in-law Jared Kushner. Trump was limited in part because of the aggressively anti-establishment route he took to the presidency, experts said.
– John Fritze
Biden’s team:Biden picks for top White House jobs draw contrast with Trump not only on policy but also style
Biden names 9 appointees:Joe Biden names 9 top White House appointees, including Rep. Cedric Richmond and campaign manager O’Malley Dillon
was ousted by President Donald Trump on Tuesday as part of a continuing post-election purge of top national security officials.
Trump announced the dismissal in two tweets Tuesday night. Twitter flagged both tweets with labels saying, “This claim about election fraud is disputed.”
The dismissal of Christopher Krebs, director of DHS’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, follows the agency’s declaration that the general election was the most secure in U.S. history.
Chris Krebs:Trump ousts Homeland Security cyber chief Chris Krebs, who called election secure
The statement served as a pointed rebuke to a president who continues to make unsubstantiated allegations of voting fraud while Trump’s legal team pursues multiple legal challenges in battleground states.
“There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised,” the agency reported Thursday in an assessment joined by a coalition of election security groups, including the National Association of State Election Directors. “All of the states with close results in the 2020 presidential race have paper records of each vote, allowing the ability to go back and count each ballot if necessary. This is an added benefit for security and resilience. This process allows for the identification and correction of any mistakes or errors.”
The former director acknowledged Trump’s action in a brief tweet Tuesday: “Honored to serve. We did it right. Defend Today, Secure Tomrorow.”
– Kevin Johnson and David Jackson